Free Online Instruction/Presentation Tools

Last Friday, District III of the NCCCLRA held it's winter meeting at Rockingham Community College. I did a presentation on the use of free instruction/presentation software to support library instruction and for publicity purposes. Some of the tools require a download to your computer, and others are completely web-based. Here's an expanded list of the software grouped into categories; all are free, and most allow you to include audio along with the presentation:

Screenshots, Screen Recorders: Webinaria, ZDsoft Screen Recorder, Jing

Power Point-Style Presentations: Thumbstacks , AuthorPoint Lite

Public Platforms for Power Point-Style Presentations: AuthorStream , SlideShare

Short Publicity Videos, Slideshows with Music: Animoto, SlideStory, RockYou

Co-Browsing Tools: Spreed, Share-It-Now, Vyew

Summary of ILI-L Listserv Discussion on Mini Instruction Sessions

There has been a pretty good discussion going on at the ILI-L listserv for a week or so about mini instruction sessions, which we have also referred to as "one-shot" presentations on this blog. Mary Murray, Instruction Librarian at Juniata College, was nice enough to post a summary of the discussion with lots of great ideas as an easily accessible MSWord document.

One-Shot Workshops: New Reference

Several comments on this blog have mentioned the need for ideas and resources to create short, one-shot library instruction presentations. If your library has a subscription to Marketing Library Services, you might want to read the full review of Jerilyn Veldof's Creating The One-Shot Library Workshop: A Step-By-Step Guide in the September-October issue. As of today, Alamance CC, Craven CC, Pitt CC, South Piedmont CC, and Wake CC all have copies on their shelves.

The Tipping Point on Power Point?

Research from the University of New South Wales explains why those power point slides may not be getting the job done. How often do you rely on Power Point for your instructional classes or presentations?